Meditation Space
by Virgo
Summary: AU version of possible events that occur in that white space in T'Pol's mind. Trip is talkative and T'Pol tries to mend fences, and we see what happens. Humble request for RR.
1. Construct

**A/N**: Rabid plot bunny that would not let me stop writing, despite laundry and needing to read "Love Letters for All Occasions" (Hey, maybe that was the inspiration.) First two parts are what I wrote it for; the last part is for some closure. AU, as this is over a couple of weeks, and we can all guess that Trip will not be gone from Enterprise for more than like, two episodes and a total of like, four days.

**Disclaimer**: I do not own Enterprise; I am not making a profit. I did steal from Paramount, but they turned me in to the University, and so I steal no longer.

* * *

He looked down at her sitting form and wondered how exactly she was sitting. He looked around and wondered how exactly he was standing, for that matter. The endless white space had no light source, but was as bright as the noon in the south, and he cast no shadow. He looked at his feet and his mind thought he may be standing on nothing, though his body said he was on firm ground.

"Fancy seeing you here," he said. She opened her large brown eyes framed by long lashes and looked up at him.

"Trip," she said softly. The silence hung in the warm white room. She spoke again: "I am trying to meditate." Her head moved back and forth in her particular gesture of frustration as she spoke, a physical signifier of condensation. She had regained her hardened demeanor.

"Well, I'm trying to calm down myself," said Trip, in his own defense. "Long shift." He lifted his chin in the air and dared her to tell him to leave.

"This is not the first time you have intruded upon my meditations."

"Most times I'm quiet," he said. "Sometimes you don't know I'm here."

"I always know you're here," said T'Pol. Her eyebrow rose. He should have known that he could not pull one over on her. They fell back into silence.

"You know, that's one selection that I never managed to choose for Movie Night." Trip grasped at topics, trying to find something to keep her from stopping her meditation.

"What is that?" she said.

"Well, there was a whole genre of twentieth and early twenty-first century movies called science fiction…"

"I don't see how science could not be considered true," she said, her eyebrow raised and her disbelief being worn like a cloak.

"Hold on, T'Pol, let me explain." Trip put his hands on his hips to let her know he meant business. "There was one movie that was wildly popular, in which there was a war between humans and machines, and it got to the point where humans had been enslaved by machines and were being grown mechanically in fields."

"Is this part of the human pathos surrounding automation as well as genetic manipulation?" she asked. She was ever the scientists, even in her subconscious.

"Suppose so, must be deep rooted in our societies." He shrugged. "Well, the machines used a computer program of the late twentieth century to make humans believe that they weren't enslaved… and some escaped that program."

"It seems that humans fancy themselves always able to overcome impossible odds."

"Well, yeah, they were fighting back and losing," said Trip, frowning. "People have to have their fantasies, I suppose… and you can't tell me that on Enterprise we didn't beat incredible odds."

"You are no longer on Enterprise. You will have to _beat the odds_ on Columbia."

Trip flinched, eyes closing and head turning away involuntarily. He recovered. "Guess I will." He paused. "To make a long story short the freedom fighters were able to reenter the machine's computer program, and before they did they always went into another program to gain items they would need in the program for freedom fighting… guns, and bombs and such." He paused, and she was listening intently, and did not even comment on the violence of humans. "Well, it was called 'The Construct' and it looked a lot like this." She didn't comment. Did he just tell a story to hear himself talk? He grasped at straws again, just happy to be in her presence, didn't want her to leave, didn't want to be called to duty… "Do you figure we could go anywhere we wanted; like they could get anything they wanted?"

"I have never tried," she acquiesced. "This was the form of meditation taught to me from childhood – the absence of everything but myself gave me great comfort and physical and mental stability."

"See, me, I would go to the beach or something. A little white noise, a little good sun, and I'd be all relaxed."

"I am not you, Commander Tucker."

"No. You're not, T'Pol."

"Commander T'Pol, we have a visitor off the port bow," said Jonathon's voice. T'Pol looked pointedly at Trip and vanished.

Trip let himself fall asleep.


	2. Letters

"We really got to stop meeting like this," Trip said, standing again watching T'Pol meditate.

"How do you suggest we meet?" T'Pol deadpanned, opening her eyes and looking up. Trip thought she deadpanned it – then again, all Vulcans were masters of understatement. "We are on different ships on different missions."

"It was a joke."

"I am aware."

They lapsed into the silence that their strange, mental encounters often consisted of. Sometimes Trip sat with her, and sometimes Trip felt the need to talk.

"You know you could write me."

"That would be illogical, as we see each other quite often like this."

"Aww, true." Trip said. "Besides, I wouldn't believe it if you sent me letters anyway."

T'Pol frowned. "Why wouldn't you believe it if I sent you a communication?"

"Old family story, I suppose."

"A family story would cause you to believe that any correspondence you receive from me would be false?"

Trip winced. Perhaps today was a bad day to talk… she sounded as if she needed the meditation herself. "Well, my family lore goes back quite far," Trip stated. "And it turns out that once upon a time there was an ancestor of mine who loved a women he went to the Naval Academy with – you see, ships are in my blood, but not as thick as Malcom's – and they got married and he went into the submarine force."

"How long ago was this?"

"Centuries."

"You family histories are impressive."

"We kept the journals for a long time, and then donated them to historical research a while back… we get free access to data-versions of them, and reading them is kind of a right of passage in my family."

"And these journals are continuous through the centuries?"

"More or less – once you start a tradition of journaling in a family, and you get everyone involved, it's hard to stop. So, anyway, he was on a West-Pac – a six month long mission in the Western Pacific, and he wasn't getting any family grams. Family grams were notes from home of only thirty words, and my ancestor was upset. So, my ancestor's CO asked my ancestor's department commander to make sure he got letters."

"That is not ethical."

"This was during the Cold War; it was important for moral to be kept up on those tiny ships – not unlike Movie Night was needed on Enterprise."

"What did these falsified letters consist of?"

"Well, it was an entire story, really. Apparently he and his wife rented out his car while he was away to visiting military officers and the first 'gram told him that an Admiral had rented his car. The second, that he had totaled it; the third that the Admiral had bought a new, better car in recompense… and when they got to port, my ancestor called his wife, and asked her about these goings on and she said it was a lie. And he found out that all of his family grams were lies."

"How did he react?"

"He told her how much he missed her and was disappointed that she didn't write, and she flew right out to see him in Hong-Kong and when she got there they had hot, steamy, make-up sex and my great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandmother was born nine months later."

"Why did she not send 'family-grams?'?"

"She thought they were pointless. She thought he knew she loved him without any tokens of affection over a six month absence. She didn't think she could say anything in thirty words."

"And you do not believe I would write you."

"No, T'Pol, you're too practical. Why would I need a note like that? Especially if there is nothing between us."

"I have a family legend I wish to tell you, as well."

"I'm listenin'."

"Many generations ago, there was a legend of my ancestor and her mate. Her mate left her, but their love was so strong, their bond so sure, that they could see each other in their mind when they both meditated."

Trip's face blanked and blanched. "Your storytelling skills need work."

"It is a very simple legend."

"Sounds more like a rumor, to me."

"It is possible to see it that way. However, I prefer to think of it as truth."

"I sure as hell believe it." Trip looked down at his feet and scraped his toe on the floor. "I have to go. I have to go on shift."

"Perhaps I will write you," she said, as he disappeared.

* * *

**A/N**: The story contained within actually happened. My dad was the departmental commander and good friend of the guy who got the fake family grams. My mom was good friends with the wife, and I was about 5 at the time, so I heard this story years later. Everything is true to the best of my eavesdropping ability. I always thought the story would suit a good T/T romance, but I could never figure out plausible reasons for them to be apart and only communicating by letter for me to write it. 


	3. Together Ever After

"Why is this happening to us, if the only thing we know about it is a Vulcan legend!" He had come to know her schedule, though she was light years away. He knew when she would be meditating, when he could reach her, and he had not been wrong.

"I imagine you did some research into the Vulcan cultural database."

She was sitting as usual, he was standing, but their faces may have well had been as close together as possible. "You imagine! You imagine! Since when do Vulcans _imagine_? You didn't finish your little legend; your little legend says that your ancestors lost their own personalities as they merged into one!"

"They did not control their bond. They did not respect logic, and instead gave into passions."

"Humans are passionate beings, T'Pol! How do you expect me to embrace logic all the time?"

"I do not know," she admitted. "I am surprised you are able to keep this meditative state when you are so agitated."

Trip ran his hand through his hair and looked over his shoulder away from her. "I don't know either. I guess it's just force of will and needing to talk to you." He lifted his chin into the air, defying her.

"I do not wish to speak with you about these intimate things when you are not ready."

"Intimate? Oh, hell, T'Pol. Tell me what's going on."

"We are bonded. We share our thoughts and experiences, if we wish. That we are able to communicate over such vast distances, it suggests that this bond is permanent."

"_Permanent_? You and I barely can stay in the same room together!"

"We seem to have no problem sharing my meditation space."

"That's because we have to!"

"We do not _have_ to," T'Pol stated, and Trip imagined he could hear a bit of sadness in her voice. "You could cut off your end of the bond, ignore it, let it grow cold, but it will always be with you."

"Are you saying you want this bond?"

T'Pol said nothing.

"Your silences are what drove me to the Columbia!" Trip raged. He stopped and went pale.

"I always thought that you left because of me."

"Yeah, well, I did." His hand went through his hair and T'Pol couldn't help but wonder if his real hair was ruffled too.

"I would like you to come back."

"You really think I can? It's not that easy. This bond thing isn't that easy. Do you think being on the same ship would be easy?"

"No harder than what we are doing now, no more difficult than our relationship was before."

"Our relationship went sour when you got married to another man when I still loved you. And then again when you decided to dedicate your life to the pursuit of enlightenment!"

"The Kir'Shara has been most helpful in the description of these bonds."

Trip stepped back and put one finger over his mouth. He narrowed his eyes. "How long have you known what was going on?"

"Since the first time we touched."

And Trip could not speak.

"We are bonded, Trip. If we did not care for one another, this would not have happened. I am beginning to believe that this is not outside of Surak's teachings."

"Sure, your prophet deems it all right, so suddenly we can be together," Trip said bitterly.

"I believe a common idea amongst humans is that relationships take work. The Kir'Shara suggests the same."

"I can't just forgive you for closing me off."

"I am open to you now," said T'Pol. "And now you know this is not just a dream."

"Being with you always seemed like a dream." Trip said quietly. He didn't look into her eyes.

"I assure you, this is not a dream." T'Pol stood, for the first time since these visions had begun occurring. She extended her right index and middle fingers in an odd handshake. Trip looked at her extended hand.

"Is that the Vulcan version of kiss-and-make-up?"

"Not in so crude terms, but a Vulcan kiss an acceptable description."

Trip extended his own right hand in the same manner and touched his beloved. They stared into her eyes, grabbed her wrist, and pulled her into a human kiss – and then they both believed everything may be all right.

_fin_

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_A/N: Sorry that this was ill planned… I tried to keep it in character, but I don't know where that got me. I hope you enjoyed… I apologize for mistakes; I just wrote and posted without anyone but me and the spell check looking at it. Any con-crit that goes beyond "Hey, your spelling and grammar sucks. And you know nothing about Canon." is absolutely welcome. Thanks for reading!


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